Best movie factual errors of 1998

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Armageddon picture

Factual error: The idea of two spacecraft blasting off together so close to each other at the same time is a joke. One would put the other at great risk. Not only is there massive fire and heat, but the vibrations from the noise of the exhaust do great damage to the surroundings. And there is great inconsistency about just how close the two spacecraft really are. The first still shot taken in the dark has them at different towers about 150 yards apart. But, then all the men take an elevator up ONE tower and are split apart into the two groups at the top of the tower. Furthermore, the launch takes place at Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39: the fixed and rotating service structures built for the Space Shuttle are visible. The pads at LC 39 are 8,700 feet apart (just over 1.5 miles). (01:00:00)

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I Still Know What You Did Last Summer picture

Factual error: At the end when Ben Willis and his son have Julie at the graves, Ray shows up with a gun. He fires at Ben but there is no bullet in the chamber. Later after the fight between Ray and Ben's son Julie picks up the six-shot gun and fires 8 shots at Ben.

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The Truman Show picture

Factual error: When the bus breaks down, steam is shown coming out of the front of the bus. GMC buses have the engine and radiator in the rear.

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Ronin picture

Factual error: When Gregor shoots the guy in the car after nearly killing the little girl, blood sprays over the window, but there's no bullet hole. If the bullet exited his head, hence spraying blood, it should have gone through the window too. (00:55:00)

Jon Sandys

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Pleasantville picture

Factual error: When Reese Witherspoon's character is sitting at the desk reading, there is a cheerleading trophy and the cheerleader on it is wearing a mini skirt, - they didn't have mini skirts on the cheerleading outfits then. (01:08:20)

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The Wedding Singer picture

Factual error: In the scene where we first meet Rosie, it opens with a shot of the house and then goes inside, passing by some pictures of Rosie and her husband. One of them, a picture of their wedding, says "Frank and Rosie - Wedding 1948", but then when Rosie is talking about how her husband will know how much she still loves him after all those years, Robbie says that he hopes that he and Linda will be as happy as Rosie and her husband on their 50th anniversary. If they got married in 1948, they would be closer to their 40th wedding anniversary. Since the movie is supposed to take place in 1985, this would actually be their 37th wedding anniversary. (00:12:10)

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Saving Private Ryan picture

Factual error: The Tiger tanks portrayed in the movie are actually Soviet T-34s. You could tell by looking at their wheels. Real Tigers had interleaved wheels. These Tigers had the T-34 suspension. Obviously, Tigers are so rare (only one operational Tiger left) that another tank had to be substituted. But an excellent job was done to make the T-34s look like Tigers.

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Godzilla picture

Factual error: The Apaches in the film are depicted with dual machine guns on each side of the cockpit, mounted directly on the windows. In real life, Apaches cannot mount such cannons, and instead use an M230 Chaingun in a turret underneath the helicopter, which the film Apaches have, but for some reason do not use. (00:49:25)

Razvaluha

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Suggested correction: Yes, we can all see they are supposed to be Apaches but not once are they mentioned by name. The US Army obviously didn't allow for real Apaches to be used. This isn't a mistake as there would have been no official licence to use the real deal.

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Les Miserables picture

Factual error: When Javert arrives in Paris to inform the Prefect that he has found Valjean, the government building displays the French Tricolour. This part of the film is set in 1823, during the Bourbon Restoration, so the flag should be the white, Bourbon flag.

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Deep Impact picture

Factual error: While the tidal wave is enveloping Manhattan, there is a scene where Washington Square Park is destroyed. A large arch is hit by the wave before reaching the rest of the park. The problem is the arch is on the UPTOWN side of the park, not the DOWNTOWN side which according to the movie was the direction the wave was coming from.

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Velvet Goldmine picture

Factual error: Near the beginning of the film, a scene opens with the subtitle 'New York'. Strange, these New Yorkers drive on the left.

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The X-Files Movie picture

Factual error: Dallas, Texas is not surrounded by desert mountains. This is a dumb tourist mistake; when that shot of downtown Dallas appeared on the screen audiences there groaned in unison. (00:07:30)

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The Mask of Zorro picture

Factual error: During the scene towards the end of the film where Alejandro is chasing Captain Love in the shack with the furnace at the mine, we see a pressure gauge just before the furnace explodes. The unit of measurement on the pressure gauge is shown as kg/cm2. Metric measures were not used in Mexico until eleven years after the film was set, and as California was a part of Mexico at the time, metric measurements would not have been used there.

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The Parent Trap picture

Factual error: If you have ever actually seen London then you can see that the route Hallie takes to get to the house would take you all around London.

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Dr. Dolittle picture

Factual error: Dr. Dolittle is driving through San Francisco with a cup of Dunkin' Donuts coffee - there are no Dunkin' Donuts in San Francisco.

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A Bug's Life picture

Factual error: The size of the shadow of an object depends upon its distance from the light source, not the surface it falls upon. Lifting the cutout of the bird a few inches closer to the sun as they do would make absolutely no difference to the size of its shadow, yet it quadruples in size.

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Enemy of the State picture

Factual error: When requesting images from the satellite, the position (latitude and longitude) is always given in degrees and minutes (but NOT seconds), and a few moments later they get a picture centered on the person they are looking for. Now a minute equals a nautical mile (or 1.85 kilometers), so with a position given in degrees and minutes you'd get a region bigger than 3 square kilometers.... which makes it impossible to find a person that fast (especially in a crowded town).

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Pi (1998)

Pi picture Pi mistake picture

Factual error: In the beginning, when pi is listed, it reads: "3.141592652631245..." when pi is actually "3.141592653589793...". (00:00:31)

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Lethal Weapon 4 picture

Factual error: Riggs is shown using a laser-sight on his handgun throughout the entire movie. However, almost every single time he turns it on, the entire "beam" of the laser is visible, which doesn't happen in real life unless there is smoke/vapor/debris in the air. Obviously done for the sake of the audience seeing where the laser is pointed, but still a mistake.

TedStixon

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